Recount underway in Dublin for European seat

It was requested by the Green Party's Eamon Ryan after the seventh and final count in the early hours of this morning.

The former Minister was deemed to have been beaten to the final seat in the constituency by Fine Gael's Brian Hayes by just over 1,100 votes out of a total poll of over 300,000.

Eamon Ryan said he doesn't expect the process to drag on for a long time.

"It's not a full, complete recount, where you go through every vote with a magnifying glass and a lawyer at each turn, looking to say: is that a seven, or is that a two?" he said.

"But it is looking to see are all the votes in the right place? Are they what they say they are in those bundles? Because it's done at three or four in the morning on the second day, when everyone is exhausted."